Dear Cheslie,
I mindlessly scrolled through Instagram when I saw a picture of you during my history class lecture. My professor’s words were mumbling through my ears as I read an Instagram post. It was a tweet from MEFeater Magazine informing your death and giving condolences to your family. I stopped breathing. I read the tweet three times. What? Former Miss USA Cheslie Kryst? From her high rise building?
I began to read the comments. Many strangers commented “Rest in Peace” next to broken hearts. This really happened, I thought. That was when I began to believe it. Small tears came through my eyes. My mind believed it, and my soul hurt. It broke my heart.
I immediately posted the tweet on my Instagram story. I messaged my sister about what happened. She already knew about it. I proceeded to tweet about it. I couldn’t keep it inside, I wanted to tell the world what I was feeling. The sudden emptiness I felt, and I never had a chance to meet this woman, or really learn about all her accomplishments, but I lost someone who I thought I knew because you mirrored my face.
You were a curly haired, brown-skinned, brown-eyed girl like me. A successful, beautiful, phenomenal woman. A role model for womanhood. Every time I saw you in the public eye, like many other famous beautiful women of color, I carried a mix of jealousy and admiration because of your glamorous face, feel-good presence, and lioness natural crown.
When you won Miss USA in 2019, I was a senior in high school. That year, all five major pageant winners, Miss America, Miss Universe, Miss World, Miss Teen USA, and Miss USA had all been Black women. It was the first time for all Black female winners in America. You were the first to win the Miss USA stage with waist-length cotton candy curls and an athletic body, while reaching top ten for Miss Universe. I remember seeing you on a television interview alongside the other fellow American winners Kaleigh Garris and Nia Franklin. I had lost interest in pageant shows at that time, but I was so happy for you all.
You were a shining star on the back of my mind. You were one of many pretty brown-skinned women I thought of seldom due to the overabundance of internet news and social media. I followed thousands of pretty brown-skinned girls on social media, and you were lost in the wave of daily posts. By the time I learned about your death, I actually had not thought about you for more than a year.
I feel guilty. I only admired you superficially. You were more than just her looks and crown.
I remember seeing you two years ago on The Real speaking about your night at the Oscars as a fashion correspondent for Extra. Co-host Jeannie Mai asked Kryst about her favorite fashion outfits of the night, and as I was watching the clip, I was in awe with your hair. Your healthy curls were long, voluminous, and the same dark color as mine. I took a screenshot from my phone. I sent the screenshot to my other sister messaging her, “one day my hair will look like this!” I was still in high school trying to figure myself out.
While observing her red carpet portraits online after your passing, I noticed this uncanny similarity with our hair. After years of experimenting, my hair identically resembles yours today, and in the pictures you were smiling artificially for others like I do too often.
I watched The Real clip again, and I noticed for the first time how jumpy and excited you got between words like I do when I am stifling my own melancholic thoughts hours or minutes before speaking to others.
It makes me think of all the times I put on a happy face, perfect outfit, and giddy attitude in college to cover up my own insecurities about my looks, demeanor, and negative outlook on my future.
Everyone, including myself, assumed you were fine. One of her co-workers recalled that you “never had a bad day.” But you were not the perfect woman in everyone’s mind. Everyone in my life assumed I was fine because I always managed to smile. People never assume the worst because we were the best at pretending.
The tweet I read learning about your death featured a picture of you in a white gown and her Miss USA sash. Most people only saw you as a beauty queen. Many of your other accomplishments either faded in my memory, or I never learned. I barely knew you. I decided to take my time to really learn of you.
You attended the University of South Carolina and graduated cum laude from Darla Moore school of business with degrees in Marketing and Human Resources and later attended the Wake Forest University of Law, where she received your Juris Doctor and Master of Business Administration.
You worked as a civil litigator representing business in lawsuits and later worked as a pro-bono lawyer in North Carolina helping incarcerated Black men with long prison sentences have a reevaluation of their cases and an advocate for prison reform.
You founded White Collar Glam, a website dedicated to help women find workwear fashion inspiration and learn tips about office wardrobe. You were also a big supporter of Dress for Success, a non-profit for low-come women to find office attire. You were also an Emmy nominated television correspondent for her time at Extra and interviewed A-list celebrities like Zendaya and Denzel Washington.
You spoke openly about her controversial views on the Trump Administration Immigration Policy, the nomination of Amy Coney Barrett, anti-abortion laws, the legalization of marijuana, and marched in Black Lives Matter protests. You said speaking against injustice made your life worthwhile.
And even with all her contributions and extracurriculars you suffered silently. You were very active on her social media. I find myself finding pictures and videos of you all over the internet. You were smiling, but you were not happy.
You had high-functioning depression and never told anyone except her mother a few days before her suicide. In her last text message, you said she could “not bear the crushing weight of persistent sadness, hopelessness, and loneliness any longer… I cry almost every day now, like I’m in mourning. I wished for death for years. ” When the police entered your apartment, they found your note of leaving everything to your mother. I know you really cared about her.
Did you feel the walls closing in on you, banging and screaming for help, but nobody could hear you because others were overbearing her cries and screams with applause and shouts of praise?
You knew she wanted to be in pageants ever since she saw her mom crowned Miss North Carolina in 2002. You served an elongated Miss USA title for 536 days because of the pandemic as the oldest winner in America's history at 28 years old. You faced cyberbullying for age and body. People went as far to have a petition for the age limit to be lowered for the Miss USA competition and telling Kryst she had a “man-body” online.
You divulged her insecurities to Allure about growing older, “... turning 30 feels like a cold reminder that I’m running out of time in society’s eyes… After a year like 2020, you’d think we’d learn that growing old is a treasure and maturity is a gift not everyone gets to enjoy.”
You never will get to enjoy the gift of growing older.
You once vaguely mentioned you were seeing a counselor for her mental health on World Health Day in 2019. Were your counselor sessions only useful for two days like mine? Did you try to be vulnerable to a stranger who tried and failed to fully understand? Did you receive ineffective, irrelevant lectures that only provided a short-term state of contentment like me?
When the counselor asked “Is everyone good, is everything okay?” Did you tell the counselor a quick “Yes,” because she thought no one could ever fix her real issues like I do when I speak to my college counselor?
I ask these questions because I can’t help but think of the similarities we share.
I’ve never been a pageant girl, I can’t help but think we experienced similar challenges in our upbringings as Black girls. Correcting people on the pronunciations of our names, contemplating our racial identities while juggling a mixed heritage, and receiving microaggressions from our classmates. Our birthdays are also two weeks apart.
Your birthday recently passed. Even though your news story only lasted a week in the press. Others let you know you would never be forgotten. Your mother said on the public memorial on your 31st birthday, “while she may not be here in person, I’ve heard many beautiful stories from many people of the impact she has had and continues to have in their lives. I’ve found so much joy in knowing there's a little of Cheslie in so many who love her.” I also saw your grandmother talk about your love for sweets and how she kept all your post cards and your sister held a heartbroken face. They all miss you.
Cheslie, I’m sorry.
I’m sorry you felt you could not open up about your mental health with anyone besides your mother that still couldn’t save you. Your passing made me look into my mental health and realize so much, and I promise I will always be transparent to others for the sake of myself. I will push the girls around me to do the same as well.
Many Black women do not open up about their mental health because of stigma and embarrassment. You did not open up to anyone because like many, you thought you couldn’t or there was no cure. For a long time, I thought there wasn’t a cure, but there is a cure. It can start as easy as talking about it. There are those cliché sayings “you’re not alone,” or “it’s okay to not be okay,” but the world is full of people that think they are alone and believe they are the only ones struggling. We need to talk to each other.
We as people have to really work on checking on friends, family, and most importantly, ourselves. We cannot help others if we don’t check ourselves first.
I know you will never be able to read this, but I wanted to write this for myself and other girls like you.
Cheslie, you will always be a constant reminder of what has stopped and could have kept going. I found myself scrolling through your Instagram while sitting in lecture class to look at pictures of you, this brown-eyed girl with your pretty cotton candy curls, to remind myself I should still be here because it is too late for you. You’ll always be on the back of my mind. Your graceful memory as a light to my life. Like how I walked the campus today, I will continue walking and living for you. I’ll take it little by little everyday, and it will be difficult, and many times unbearable, but I will keep going for you. Women are destined to reign the earth until the end of time, and I’ll hold onto my natural crown.
In deepest love,
Dalianny
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